Shooting puts end to Red Cross rescue

Press, 6 August 1976, Page 5

Shooting puts end to Red Cross rescue

(NZPA-Reuter Beirut The International Red Cross has suspended its evacuation of more than 1000 wounded from the beleaguered Tel Al-Zaatar Palestinian refugee camp in Beirut because of uncer-’ tainties over security. The Red Cross public rela- i tions officer in Lebanon! I (Miss Michele Mercier) said {the suspension decision was taken after a bullet had hit a doctor’s car and a shell had exploded in the football field used as a staging point for the wounded just as the last truck of the Red Cross!

[■convoy was leaving on I Wednesday night. I “We cannot take this in a fllight way,” she said. i! The Red Cross evacuated ■1243 wounded from the camp • on Wednesday. On Tuesday, {the first day of the oft-post-Jponed operation, 91 were ! evacuated. I The Red Cross had ‘planned to continue the evacuation until al! the wounded were taken out, but! Miss Mercier said more dis-1 cussions with the Rightist leaders controlling areas] around the camp were; needed before it could re-i isume. Il

Leaders of both sides agreed to_ a cease-fire beginning at 5 p.m. (N.Z. time) yesterday, the fifty-fourth truce in' 16 months of civil war.

A text of the cease-fire agreement, broadcast by the Right-wing Phalangist radio, said it included provisions for an end to sniping, shelling, and kidnapping. It also provided for rej opening Beirut Airport to ■ normal traffic by August 15land for the restoration of electricity, telephone, and (water services, which have (been thrown into chaos by the war.